Violation of code of conduct: DU constitutes fact-finding team

New Delhi: Delhi University on Tuesday constituted a three-member fact-finding committee to look into complaints of violation of election code of conduct by 11 candidates, including the victorious ones, who were issued a showcase notice to explain use of printed posters.

Chief election officer CS Dubey had sought explanations from 11 candidates regarding allegations of violation of the Lyngdoh committee recommendations by the contestants during campaign.

A notification from varsity said today that the Vice Chancellor, as patron of the DUSU, constituted a fact finding committee as per the proposal of the chief election officer to look upon the case of violation of code of conduct and showcase notice to 11 candidates as per violation of the decision of the Supreme Court, 2006 in respect of students union election.

The showcase was issued to 11 candidates including eight from the main outfits NSUI and ABVP on complaints that they used printed posters in violation of the election code.

The explanations were sought before the poling but a decision on the responses had not yet been taken.

Those who were served the notice include the victorious candidates of NSUI Arun Hooda, Varun Khari and Varun Choudhary as well as the two candidates who were tied for the post of joint secretary.

The candidates in their response had maintained that they were not responsible for disseminating the posters and pamphlets in question and were not aware of such a violation.

The three-member committee will be chaired by Ramesh Gautam, Director of Institute of Life Long Learning, and professor in the Department of Hindi. The other two members are R C Kunad, professor in Department of Microbiology, and Sunil Sondhi, principal of Maharaja Agrasen college.

The ABVP, which has accused the administration of bias following the results which it has refused to accept, again cried foul today, saying the committee was clearly "Congress minded" and is not expected to come out with a fair decision.

"This defeats the entire purpose of a probe. We do not believe that these congress minded people have been appointed with an intention of arriving at a fair decision. We have demanded that a person from outside the university,may be a tired judge, look into the issue," said ABVP state secretary Rohit Chahal.